About the AuthorLucas Mearian

Wireless charging has been around for more than a quarter of a century, but only over the past decade did smartphone manufacturers begin offering it natively in their handsets.In 2012, Nokia was the first to adopt the Qi-based wireless charging in i…

It is also an acknowledgement that an ecosystem dominated by hardware manufacturers and telecom providers – each with a set of priorities and plans that doesn’t dovetail with Google’s – results in a myriad of devices that run the gamut of quality.

With that in mind, Google’s buyout of HTC’s engineering IP will enable it to create a pure Android play by marrying hardware and software in a move that could eventually reduce fragmentation in the Android ecosystem.

With the official launch of iOS 11 this week, Apple has introduced more PC-like capabilities to its mobile devices – especially the iPad – so workers can more often use them for daily tasks.

While that’s good news for companies focused on a mobile-first strategy, what could be an even greater boon for business is iOS’s native augmented reality (AR) play, via its ARKit SDK.

While Apple’s AR move may appear at first blush to be focused on consumers with animated emojis and masks, native AR toolkits open up a world of possibilities for business users and app developers, according to IDC analyst Bryan Bassett.

When you use PayPal, Apple Pay, Google Wallet or simply your credit card to make an online purchase, you the consumer, the ecommerce retailer and the banks behind the money exchange are using FinTech.When Charles Schwab, TD Ameritrade or Fidelity In…

Apple announced on tuesday that iOS 11 will be available be available on Sept. 19. It has been in public beta since mid-summer.

Microsoft began releasing developer and beta builds of its EMM cloud service a few months ago, and said its Intune development team has been working to ensure that all of its mobile device management (MDM) and mobile application management (MAM) tools will work seamlessly on iOS 11.

As expected, Apple’s new iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X will be able to be joined with a new wireless charging accessory based on the Qi standard – the most popular among three main industry specifications.

An Apple-designed charging pad, called AirPower, will be available in 2018; it will offer a large charging area that will allow up to three devices, including Apple Watch Series 3 and a new optional wireless charging case for AirPods, to power up simultaneously.

For decades, Apple tried to push into the enterprise market through the data center back door. In the 1990s, it rolled out its Apple Network Server, which quickly failed. In the early 2000s, it introduced its Xserve line – a data center server that lasted in various iterations through 2011, but never gained traction.

More recently, it has pinned its hopes on partnerships with leading software and service providers, hoping to capture more of the seemingly elusive, but lucrative, enterprise market.

In truth, Apple has already won.

To be certain, Microsoft still dominates the workplace desktop and laptop space. But Apple – which tomorrow will unveil new iPhones – recognizes who it is and who it isn’t. As Sun Tzu wrote in the Art of War, “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles.”

Collaboration software vendor Atlassian today unveiled a new enterprise product that provides text, voice, video, file sharing and other workplace collaboration tools that allow portions of group text threads to be set aside as sidebar tasks to be c…

Enterprise mobility management (EMM) software vendor MobileIron today announced its Apple release, aimed at the growing need for enterprises to provide IT managers with more robust management and security features for Macs.

While Windows and even Chrome-based laptops are already included in EMM consoles, macOS hardware has traditionally been treated as an outlier in the office, according to Nick McGuire, vice president of Enterprise Research at CCS Insight.

While MobileIron’s software suite already supported macOS for basic functions, including device configuration, millennials entering the workforce favor Apple’s line of laptops – driving the need for a unified endpoint management strategy that includes security and bulk licensing, according to Ojas Rege, MobileIron’s chief strategy officer.

SanDisk this week introduced the 400GB Ultra microSDXC UHS-I card, which is not only the world’s highest capacity microSD card but one from which smartphones, tablets or laptops can run applications.

According to SanDisk, the micro SDcard achieves UHS Speed Class 1 – the best performance available for a microSD card and one that enables the speedy loading and running of apps.

“What this means for users is that, in theory, they will no longer be limited to only having apps on the main memory in the device,” said Jack Gold, principal analyst with J. Gold Associates. “Many users fill up that memory and now they have an option, if the device supports it, to greatly expand the amount of apps they can use on the device. This is pretty much equivalent to putting a USB drive on your computer and running apps from that.”

Global consultancy and business services firm Accenture unveiled a partnership with Apple designed to help businesses develop new applications and use cases for iPhones and iPads.

Accenture, which helps companies develop and deploy custom business apps, announced a new dedicated iOS practice within its Digital Studios in select locations around the world. Experts from Apple, including software and hardware developers, data architects and data scientists, will also be co-located in Accenture’s iOS practice offices.

A simple upgrade that Android smartphone users have enjoyed for years may finally be coming to the iPhone: wireless charging.

The technology would allow iPhone owners to simply lay their devices on a charging pad – something that’s also been embedded in furniture and vehicles – to recharge. Wireless charging hardware possibly related to the next iPhone has been shown in a series of photographs published by Chinese blog site Weibo.

While add-on, external iPhone covers have allowed wireless charging for some time , if the photos and a leaked document are genuine, the “iPhone 8” could contain the technology natively.

Microsoft is shutting down a work collaboration application it has been piloting over the past year, saying only that it learned a lot from the project and that the experience would help it with future products.In a blog post, Microsoft stated simpl…

Microsoft is shutting down a work collaboration application it has been piloting over the past year, saying only that it learned a lot from the project and that the experience would help it with future products.In a blog post, Microsoft stated simpl…

Among other things, IT managers will be able to perform a number of tasks including on-boarding employees; provisioning, auditing and tracking hardware; device wiping; and securing access to personalized enterprise app catalogs.